Long/humour Re: Noahpology

[howard <pencil -at- WAVENET -dot- CO -dot- UK>]

Apologies if this is either inappropriate or causes complaint. Neither is
meant & I hope it will be read in that spirit...

>OK it's Friday. Well Leonard, apology accepted. But I'd like to jump in.
>The Bible does not record whatever explicit instructions God gave to Noah
>other than length, width (beam) and height of the ark. That doesn't make
>God a bad technical communicator. With whatever directions he received,
>Noah was able to build a boat larger than any that had ever existed up to
>that time or for the next several thousand years. The boat, built to
>specifications, was suited for the task (without alpha or beta testing). In
>short, a successful outcome. It looks like God did his audience analysis
>and communicated clearly enough so Noah could complete his task. If only we
>were all that successful.
>
>I think of a lot of the problems with God to people communications has to
>do with selective listening on our part. It isn't so much the fault of the
>communicator. In our everyday work, we need to be good listeners if we want
>to pass on anything but junk.
>
>Have a great weekend everyone.
>

Not wanting to denigrate anyone else's beliefs here I'll try and keep this
as short & relevant to TW/TC as possible.

It's my belief that, according to the texts, God "...told..." Noah how to
build the Ark - which may well have been anything from a "flash of
inspiration" to a direct-neural-inteface type multi-media presentation,
maybe even an ogoing mentor-student relationship (on-the-job training?).

It doesn't preclude Noah taking notes, refining the brief, or even being
creative during construction whilst keeping an eye on the spec sheet.

Also, Noah - whilst he ended up in the dubious position of being the head
of the only family left alive - was, during the construction of the Ark,
certainly operating within society and could well have benefitted from any
amount of passing comments from incredulous but well-meaning friends and
neighbours.

Any plans that may have been drawn up, schematics, schedules, outsourcing
arrangements or construction requirements (power, steering, safety,
sanitation) etc and the relevant laws which applied to these will perhaps
have disinegrated in the deluge - not that there was anyone left to enforce
them, and even then there may have been personal-use-only or social,
domestic & pleasure clauses in operation.

In addition, product liability was not an issue AFAIAA...

So, what do learn from this? Absolutely nothing! Except maybe that TCs/TWs
should be shipped with the product until the purchaser knows well enough
how to operate it (now how many of us would want that - that's technical
training, not writing...). Or perhaps, the TWs of the time supplied such
good manuals for the tools that Noah used that he was able to construct the
boat well and quickly.

In which case, well, they too were deluged...and it's taken several
thousand years for us to convince each other (never mind society as a
whole) that documentation can be clear, accurate and actually tell you how
to do what you want to do.

Certainly, we could all do with communication tools that include
telepathic, or empathic, non-physical cues on appropriate usage of
products...the old "try querying the preferences for this problem..." type
feeling we only employ when all else has failed...

...but how many of us would outsource this to a being who, when questioned
on its own nature will only say "I AM"?

Great for theologians - and an inspiration to philosophy since, admittedly,
but not much use to an irate customer whose widgets are coming out too
small and must be written off, or whose bitmaps keep degrading to 256
colours instead of staying in photo-realistic 16.7 million...

Besides, how many of your customers would like to see an authorship
crediting a radical revision - complete restructuring, rewriting, the works
- to a document by one who is "the same yesterday, today and forever..."?

No offence to God meant at all, but when my computer plays up I tend to
sort it, when my immortal soul's in trouble I may give him a call.

howard

--
*theabovemessagedoesnotnecessaril
managAr parChonmorliez? SilateezntelizSane...readRlips - deliriupS
"Olninezapa! telimuapan..." (stufftie gong-hall y8a9m) hint: Anagram
H Billington - BA Tech Comm Writing/Proofing/Editing/DTP...etc


 From ??? -at- ??? Sun Jan 00 00:00:00 0000=